


Perfect

by iisintrovert



Series: Colors [1]
Category: Free!
Genre: Fluff, Kissing, M/M, autistic characters, autistic rei is my fav, discussion of mental ilness, nagirei - Freeform, okay maybe a lot of kissing, plz, reigisa - Freeform, this is just background for "I see the colors you speak"
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-30
Updated: 2015-11-30
Packaged: 2018-05-04 02:36:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5317307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iisintrovert/pseuds/iisintrovert
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rei has thought for his whole life that he had to be perfect, to be smart, to be beautiful - all because he heard people say that when he was young.<br/>While doing a research project on mental diverge cues and their thought of causes, he discovers that the symptoms of one in particular are a bit too familiar. Suddenly, he feels like everything is falling apart. he doesn't know what to do, except go to him.<br/>Background for If I Could See The Colors You Speak, but that isn't required to be read for this to make sense.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Perfect

**Author's Note:**

> Time to prove my favorite headcanon. Step back everyone, get ready to have your mind blown.

This had been a difficult thing coming. A sense of foreboding, a suspicion with no evidence to back it up. Rei had thought something about him was different for a very long time.

He knew he should have known, he should have _seen._ He should have, from all of his research and intelligence, been able to figure it out on his own. He knew that he should have figured it all out sooner.

Who knew? Did other people know? Had they guessed? Did his parents know and not tell him?

Rei took in a shuddering breath and turned away from his computer. What he needed to do was calm down – asses the facts.

The problem was, this time, he didn't want to know what the facts led to.

But facts...they were calming. They rarely lied, they were easily disproved. Statistics told the truth and hinted to various other truths. Rei could trust them. He wanted to trust them with all his heart -- the facts his parents had told him his entire life, the facts everyone around him had lived by.

_You are normal. You are human. You are just like everybody else._

Rei lifted himself from his desk chair, turned off the computer monitor, and flung himself into bed.

Fact: he never did like sarcasm. He doesn't understand metaphors, and is often teased for not understanding them. He studied disproportionately for Japanese classes than he did with others. He hated it when people make jokes. He did not like jokes. Except, maybe, when they made people smile. He quite enjoyed it when Nagisa smiled.

Fact: “Stimming” is a slightly voluntary action that causes intentional stimulation, normally occurring when a person is nuerodivergent. Examples included tactile stims, like tapping, touching, scratching, and flicking. There were also vestibule stims, like jumping up and down, rubbing your hands or feet together, and smacking your skin. Rei did this quite a lot. He tended to 'fiddle,' as it was also called in the online article he had read on the subject. Like when an individual fixed their tie and glasses and unbuttoned and re-buttoned their top shirt buttons and stretched their muscles and bouncing on their toes when they were bored or nervous. Like _everything_ he could remember doing since he was old enough to feel nervous.

fact: he struggles forming bonds with his peers, struggles to relate to them. Talking to them was less than desirable, unless they were friends of his, in which case he would do anything to help them and make them happy. Rei had a whole four friends, if you counted Rin. This seemed average to him, but apparently he was wrong.

Fact: People like... _this_ have problems with schedule flexibility, differentiation, and collaboration.

Another fact: Anxiety, insomnia, and daytime sleeping problems often occurred during adolescence.

Rei felt a pang in his chest. He didn't want to think about this anymore, didn't want to know, didn't want to feel anything broken or not perfect or wrong. His parents had stressed to him for as long as he could remember that he had to try, much harder than his peers, to be absolutely perfect. He couldn't think like this.

And yet, the thought wouldn't go away.

He buried himself in his pillow, groaning as quietly as he could.

He had to face it. Considering the probability and likelihood, the symptoms and how they related to him...it was simply too illogical to ignore. He had to face the truth, the most logical solution to his problems. If he did, then he might be able to counter it. Might be able to research it. Might be able to help others.

Rei shook his head and stared up at the ceiling.

_I...I'm autistic._

He shrugged to himself.

_Well, ASD, at least. That's me. Most likely. It's the only logical solution._ He smiled ruefully. _You can't back away from it now, can you._

He sighed, and sat up. He didn't realize there were tears on his face until he reached up to fix his glasses.

He felt the sides of his face with wonder. He was crying. No, not just that, he was sobbing. But why? This didn't make sense. This was not logical at all. People cry when they are sad, and sometimes when they get so happy they become sad, or if they are pregnant or menstruating, sometimes for no reason. Sometimes people cry when they are stressed, but only a few people get so stressed that it makes them tear up. Rei was one of those people.

But why was he, now, crying? He had found out something about himself, sure. It was scary, yes. Oh, that was right. Some people cry when they get very scared. But he wasn't at the level of fear that required crying, was he? Rei couldn't tell. Rei didn't even know if he _was_ scared.

Rei pressed the palms of his hands to his ears and squeezed, hard. No, these were too many questions he didn't know the answer to. He couldn't keep asking them, there were no answers, stop, _stop_.

He was crying. As much as it hurt, he had to come to realize that there was a part of him that felt the need to be sad. He was broken. He didn't know what to do. This was not beautiful, not perfect, not like he had to be, like his parents had told him to be when he was younger. Because beauty and perfection are important.

So what could he do? At least that, he knew the answer to.

He flipped his phone open, texted out the proper message, read it aloud a few times to make sure it was grammatically correct, sent it, and left the house without waiting for a response.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

He stood outside his door. He was shaking, practically, hands vibrating with nerves. Rei couldn't be sure if that was from the fear, or nerves, or the 'stims' or anything besides terrible sadness and confusion. His hand held a tremor in as he reached out to ring the buzzer beside the wooden door of the house.

HE heard the muffled sound of someone yelling “It's open!”, twisted the door nob, and stepped over the threshold.

“Nagisa-kun, you shouldn't just let people walk into your house!” Rei called out as he closed the door and slipped off his shoes.

The boy himself leaned over the corner of wall before his living room. “What, are you gonna hurt me, Rei-chan?” he asked with a wink.

Rei frowned. “Of course not. I would never.”

Like usual, Nagisa rolled his eyes with a slight sigh, smiled and dropped the topic. Except this time wasn't like usual. Rei knew, now, that there was something that he was missing.

“What did you mean, Nagisa-kun?” he asked in a quiet voice.

Nagisa frowned. “Hm?” He raised an eyebrow and stepped into the foyer, walking closer to him until he could reach out and take his hands in both of his and pull him into the family room. “My parents aren't home, if you were wondering.” he said mischievously.

Rei furrowed his eyebrows. “I wasn't. Why would I –” He shook his head. Back to the topic at hand. “Earlier –”

“When?” Nagisa asked innocently.

“Just now. You made a joke. I – I didn't get it.” He whispered, looking away from Nagisa's eyes.

Nagisa giggled. “You never do. I don't mind.”

Rei's face fell. He...he never does. He doesn't get the jokes, he doesn't understand, it's too much, he has to be smart, to be perfect, beautiful –

He pushed his glasses up, scraping his fingers against his sweat shirt and realized that his chest was heaving again. Nagisa looked up at him, smile gone. Oh, he wished his smile would come back.

“Rei...” Nagisa dropped his hands. “Rei-chan, what's wrong? Please tell me what's wrong.” Nagisa placed his hands on the front of his chest and wound his fingers in the fabric of his sweater, pressing up against him until he was sitting on the couch – when had they gotten this far into the living room? “Please,” he murmured. “Please, Rei-chan, why are you crying?”

Rei placed his head in his hands and just cried.

Heaving sobs. He didn't even know where they were coming from, only that they were there, and running on some sort of track. They would be over, but now...there was no way to stop them. And so he didn't. He pulled his legs up onto the couch, buried his head in his hands and cried. Nagisa sat next to him, petting him on the back and rubbing his shoulder, whispering into his ear. One of his hands was carding through his hair as he murmured.

Suddenly, Rei realized that the tears had stopped. It was over, for now, at least.

Nagisa, however, just seemed to be starting.

“Rei-chan,” he cleared his throat. “I don't know what I did but I wont do it anymore just _please_ tell me –” he hiccuped. “I can't watch you cry...” his eyes widened and he scooted slightly closer to Rei. “No! I didn't mean it like that, you can cry, it's okay, you can cry if you need t – oomph!”

He was cut off as Rei scooped him into a crushing hug.

“It's...it's alright.” he muttered into his soft hair, tucking his nose above his ear and breathing in deeply. “I – I,” He nearly started crying again. _No, you can't_ he told himself. “I'm on the autism spectrum.” he mumbled.

Nagisa dug his fingers into the sliver of exposed flesh on his shoulder. “I can't hear you,” he said, backing up only enough to look Rei in the eyes.

“I'm autistic.

Nagisa frowned, raising an eyebrow. “Yeah, same?”

Re looked back at him in shock. "You..."

Nagisa shrugged. "It doesn't affect me too much, but I am ADHD. I have to take pills or I start bouncing off the walls. I don't take them too often though...they make my head feel all foggy. Sometimes they make me so hungry i could eat a hundred Iwatobi breads! My parent's get angry when I don't take them because I can't pay attention in class, but how can i swim with you and Makoto and Haru if my head feels all numb and fuzzy?" HE spoke like this was a travesty that barely affected him, throwing his head back dramatically.

Rei sat back and took it all in. It made sense, really. he opened his mouth, searching for the right words -- they came, but only loud enough for a faint whisper. "My parents didn't tell me. They knew, somehow, before i did, and this whole time -- they've been training me to be different.”

“I don't understand.” He rubbed his hands over his shoulders, clenching his fingers around Rei's arms where they wrapped around his back. “You're just you. You're still the same Rei-chan, right? Nothing changed.”

Rei leaned his forehead against Nagisa's shoulder and nearly whimpered. He didn't understand. He didn't understand why it was bad, and that was the bad thing. It was just because of what people had said – his mother, telling him to stay perfect when he was a giggly child, people at school bullying him. He didn't understand why it was bad, only that it was. “I –” he stammered.

Nagisa placed his hands on either side of Rei's face, lifting him to look him in the eye. He giggled. “Well, now it makes sense why you don't seem to get it when I do thing like this.” he whispered, rubbing a thumb along Rei's cheekbone.

Rei blushed. He didn't know what he meant by that, but he felt – different. He knew what he was feeling. He was sitting so close to Nagisa, he could feel the warmth of his hands spreading across his face and behind and his heart. He knew what he felt about Nagisa, he just couldn't ever be sure if he were being physical, or if he...

No. _You can't think of him like that. You're friends. Just that. He's too much for you, too good, too pure._

He stared down at Nagisa's face, Nagisa, his wide, magenta eyes, his button nose, the light smattering of freckles across his soft cheekbones, _him,_ He was so close to him it wouldn't be hard at all just to lean forward and –

He never got the chance. Nagisa was pulling away from him.

And then he was wrapping his arms around his shoulders and pressing into him and kissing him, hard, with every bit of furious emotion in his chest at once. Nagisa's lips pressed against his, not moving, no, not yet. He was waiting. His lips were tentative and shy, nervous and ready to pull back at any second and _no_ Rei didn't want him to go away. He just wanted him to be closer, pressing into him until the pressure squeezed his rib bones flat.

He planted his hands on Nagisa's hips and pulled him in, against his chest until he was practically draped across his lap, lips never leaving his. Given this whisper of unspoken permission he leaned in _closer_ if that were even possibly, his lips yielding to Rei's. He tilted his head for a better angle. He could smell the slight chlorine on his skin, taste his lips, minty gum – or possibly toothpaste – and the slight salt of whatever he had just been eating before Rei had gotten there.

Rei's fingers clenched tighter, and lapped at Nagisa's lips, not because he thought he was supposed to but because this might be his only chance.

Nagisa groaned, tightening his own grip on his neck and dug his fingers into the hair at the back of his head and it felt _good,_ and slightly odd and new and foreign but he loved it. He needed it.

He felt the slight scratch of his teeth against his bottom lip and pressed his face forward and his teeth clicked against Nagisa's and their noses brushed against each other. Nagisa giggled into their kiss.

Rei was leaning back, letting go of his waist to loop his arms around his back as he hummed -- he heard a car door slam at the front of the house.

Reluctantly, he pulled away, unaware of how fast his heart was beating. He peered down at Nagisa.

He looked – and Rei hated to use this adjective, but it was true, his lips swollen and eyes just slightly hooded, hair a mess and grinning like the Cheshire cat, he looked delicious.

“You parents?” he whispered.

Nagisa grinned sheepishly and lowered his eyes to the space between them. “Mom. She went grocery shopping a few hours ago.”

Rei nodded, upsetting Nagisa on his lap and picked him up. Nagisa cried out in surprise but it quickly turned to a giggle.

“I like you, Rei-chan. All of you. That being said, if you want to talk about it –”

“Really Nagisa, I would, but currently I'd rather be kissing you in your bedroom, if that's okay.”

Nagisa planted a kiss on his cheek and clutched at his shoulders. “No, That's fine. That's perfect.” He nuzzled into his neck. “You're perfect. I know what you think, but you're perfect.”

**Author's Note:**

> Alright guys. Make sure to be kind to people, to me. By that, I mean don't try to call me out about writing about a mental illness because - shocker, maybe - I'm autistic (loud meme sounds). Please don't write about neurodiverse people that you don't know anything about.  
> However, feel free to read the companion fic to this! It's chaptered and lovely! It's got blind!Haru and MakoHaru!  
> Also, my tumblr iisintrovert as well. Tag things with fic: colors


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